


I avenged Atlantis. The price I paid to do so may have been too high.

by HelixDraxzonyx



Series: HelixDraxzonyx's Horror Shorts Collection [10]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-03
Updated: 2020-11-03
Packaged: 2021-03-08 18:28:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,659
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27371185
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HelixDraxzonyx/pseuds/HelixDraxzonyx
Summary: Orion; a mysterious and unnaturally powerful member of The Institute, shares a brief account of his former life as a soldier, as well as an incident that took place in the lost nation of Atlantis. His origin story sheds light on the person he is, and why he urges people not to depend upon him or The Institute.
Series: HelixDraxzonyx's Horror Shorts Collection [10]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1547110
Kudos: 1





	I avenged Atlantis. The price I paid to do so may have been too high.

Hello friends. My name is Orion, I'm sure you're somewhat familiar with the name by now. I've been content to merely spectate as Joanna posted articles of various incidents that The Institute has dealt with. At her urging, I've taken it upon myself to tell my own story, of how I came to possess the powers that I do, my role in founding The Institute, and in particular: a certain event that took place roughly 7,500 years ago. Said event will, I hope, explain the logic behind my insistence upon Joanna publishing the account of the creatures we call Joy Hunters. My story begins more than five billion years ago, and in another universe.

I was born in a town called Runeswood, which does not exist in your universe. As a youth, I was always considered to be exceptionally intelligent. If I applied my mind to anything, I would always achieve the highest results possible. I graduated from Secondary School with the highest grades in the country for someone of that educational level. So it was very very strange to everyone who knew me when I enlisted to join the British Army. There is logic to that, of course. While it's true that I could have chosen any intellectual career path, none of them thrilled me. My gift with knowledge meant that I was never really taxing my mental faculties. I merely had to apply myself to some degree, and anything I didn't know beforehand would very quickly fall into place. I wanted to challenge myself, but mentally that just wasn't proving to be possible, and so I chose to challenge myself physically instead. True enough, I could have chosen the path of martial arts, or various outdoor pursuits, but none of those really serve a purpose beyond entertainment, or some very limited application that many people can go their entire life without making use of. Military service on the other hand, serves a purpose. At least, it served more of a purpose in my universe than it does in yours. While many events in both universes are the same, there are also considerable differences. I will not go into detail however as it diverts from the topic of the story.

In the Army, I continued to excel, though not to the same degree that I did academically. Physical fitness is something that anyone can achieve, and so I had competition. Firearm proficiency was just the same. The only places I could excel, similarly to Joanna, were in areas of strategy. Once I had completed training, I was to enter active duty, but my first tour was not at all what I was expecting. There are, as I say, a number of differences between my universe and yours. World War II went on for three years longer in my universe, with Britain and Germany trading strikes with atomic weapons. The Cold War was more of a war than a genital jousting contest. Russia annexing Crimea was just the first step in a bigger conflict, and it was because of that that I was expecting to be deployed to Ukraine to bolster the defence against Russia. I never saw a domestic deployment coming.

What was about to unfold was something that no-one on Earth could have predicted. I'll strip the details right down to the bare bone since they're not important. It transpired that DARPA had created a device, installed upon a satellite, that could resurrect the dead, for a brief period. They had military applications in mind. Somehow, their systems were infiltrated, the device was activated but not calibrated. It was fired. It did not resurrect Humans, however. It resurrected dinosaurs, of all things, and my first real combat experience was against dinosaurs. To make matters worse, we learned that fossils of dragons had been discovered, and that they too had been resurrected. Events snowballed upon us, and the world was swept up in a five-year battle for survival against dinosaurs and dragons. Eventually that battle came to an end, but as soon as it did, another began. Russian forces swept across the globe like wildfire, sweeping aside our battered and virtually non-existent defences. They'd hidden their armed forces during the five years of hell, expecting us to do the work for them, then took advantage of our weakened state. They nearly took over the whole world, but we halted their advance at Britain itself. I, who was holding the rank of Field Marshal by this time, led the push back against Russia. It was another five years before this war ended as well. Russia was defeated, the world set free. Peace returned.

Ten years passed. No wars were fought since. No conflicts of any kind, really. I had taken up a job as security for Earth Space Administration. There were no real conflicts, but there were still remnants of the last war with Russia, occasional terrorist attacks and the like. ESA had just finished developing their first Deep Space Exploration vessel, one with faster-than-light capabilities. It was due to launch that day, so I was extra alert. I noticed the gap that had appeared in security patrols and investigated immediately. We had an intruder, one who wouldn't hesitate to kill. I tracked them down aboard the vessel; the Excelsior. I was expecting a Russian or North Korean, or maybe someone Chinese. It wasn't. He was Italian, he was Catholic, and he was spouting nonsense about the vessel being an affront to God. He had killed the crew by the time I caught up with him, and was attempting to sabotage the FTL drive. I tried to restrain him, but he was equipped with an Exo: a military-grade exoskeleton which was used in the recent wars, whereas I wasn't. Even so, I was a seasoned military veteran, one who had survived against far greater enemies than a religious nutcase. In the tussle, the FTL drive was initiated, but in its damaged state it wasn't going to function properly. Time seemed to freeze as the Excelsior ripped apart, and the fabric of space and time did as well. The intruder was eviscerated by debris, but I... I ended up in a wormhole. It spat me out in deep space.

And yet, I didn't die. I floated in the vacuum of space, but it didn't kill me. I didn't freeze to death, I didn't suffocate, I didn't burst like a balloon. I just drifted in substantial pain for I don't know how long. At some point the pain just faded away. To amuse myself, I tried to see what I could do. Spinning myself drunkenly was very easy, as it turns out. It was entirely by accident that I produced a ball of fire in my right hand. Over time, I discovered many more abilities like that. In the course of my drifting, I came upon a gigantic nebula. I watched as the nebula gradually coalesced to form a star, ten planets, and many more, much smaller objects. It wasn't until I saw one planet collide into another, tilting it off-axis and forming a moon from the debris that I realised I was looking at our Solar System. Even with my abilities, it still took a substantial amount of time for me to enter the Solar System. Doing so caused some inadvertent side effects. Let's just say that I'm the reason that Pluto spends a part of its orbit closer to the sun than Neptune does before swinging back out again. I'm also the reason Saturn has the rings that it does. By the time I finally made it to Earth, the planet was in the height of the Carboniferous Era. I spent most of my time since then surviving the dinosaurs, killing dragons and other monsters, and erasing their existence, along with my own. I didn't want to risk upsetting the fossil record. It wasn't until around forty thousand years ago that I realised I hadn't simply been sent back in time, but into a different universe altogether.

I'll admit, the various supernatural monsters I faced should have been a giveaway, but I couldn't rule out that they hadn't existed in my own universe. Just because I never saw them, doesn't mean they weren't there. At any rate, forty thousand years ago I found myself in the Black Sea region. I'd come across a volcanic island which seemed like a decent place to live. Apparently, the local Humans had the same idea. They paid little attention to me, and I to them, for about thirty thousand years. Then they started developing Bronze tools. That set off flags in my mind. This was millennia before the Bronze Age, so how had these guys figured out how to make Bronze tools? As it turns out, the volcano was bringing up lots of Tin and Copper. By chance, the locals had managed to smelt the two and make Bronze. They got very good at it, too. Their woodworking, masonry and other skills were developing fast as well, and the discovery of Bronze accelerated this further. Then it hit me. I had stumbled upon a place that only existed in my world as fiction. I was living in Atlantis. 

As it turns out, Atlantis was not nearly as mystical as some stories depicted it to be. In fact, the most accurate depiction I know of is the story 'Atlantis' by David Gibbins. Even the location he gave was very close to true. Atlantis was located in the Black Sea, several miles north of Turkey. At the time, the sea levels were much much lower, enough so that the Bosporus would have been a land bridge. Atlantis was able to become advanced for its time due to a culmination of coincidences and ideal factors. The volcano provided fertile soil, as well as plenty of minerals and gems not found elsewhere. There was abundant access to Tin and Copper for Bronze, as well as Gold, obsidian, and marble. Healthy crops could be grown relatively easily and produced high yields of high quality goods. There was ample salt in the region, which had its own value. Fishing was another area that could be used well to enrich the region. There was plenty of lumber for woodwork and ship-building, while stone and flint were used for artisan crafting. Raising livestock proved to be easy due to the ideal climate and abundant food. Atlantis was governed by priests, who alone possessed the knowledge of how to smelt Bronze, as well as how to work obsidian and Gold. They carefully controlled this knowledge, keeping it from being used for militaristic purposes. Without conflict or warfare, the people of Atlantis were free to hone their skills and advance their crafts far ahead of neighbouring settlements. They thrived in their isolation. 

It was around this time that The Institute was founded. It might seem strange, but when I tell you that The Institute is actually an intergalactic organisation, then perhaps it will seem less strange. Around ten thousand years ago, an alien species discovered Earth, and landed their craft some way away from Atlantis. The natives didn't notice. I did. So did the other alien species that had already been watching over Atlantis for five years. I had left the latter species alone for the time being, but with a second species arriving I decided it was time to make my presence known to both of them. I orchestrated the meeting. The Setvirians, who had arrived on Earth first, knew of my existence but had paid little attention to me since I lived a solitary and uninteresting life. The Vraknirma on the other hand were more advanced, and had noticed that I was an anomaly. The more they learned about me, the more they realised they should have studied me intently. Once I determined that they had no ill intentions, I relaxed around them. Both species were merely explorers, seeking out inhabited planets and studying the natives in secret. They had policies of non-interference, though I had thrown that into disarray by forcing contact with them. After many discussions, we agreed upon a treaty, of sorts, to support and assist one another, as well as any other inhabited planets we came across. Since Earth was at the heart of the network of inhabited planets so far discovered, it made sense for this planet to become the home of The Institute. It was founded that day, in a secret portion of Atlantis. The headquarters reside in Atlantis to this day.

With my permission, the Vraknirma conducted a number of tests upon me to try and understand the origins of my abilities, which defied the laws of physics. The tests were... not exactly inconclusive, but they didn't tell me anything I hadn't already guessed. When the Excelsior had been triggered, with its damaged FTL drive, the resulting wormhole had fractured the fabric of reality. As I fell through this wormhole, it altered and mutated my physiology in ways that, under normal circumstances, would have been impossible. With me falling through a breach in reality, however, the impossible became possible. I'd more or less assumed that that had been the case anyway, so I didn't learn anything new. It just confirmed a theory that I'd already formulated. With the help of their technology, and that of the Setvirians, we managed to find the point in space where I had been ejected. We found the wormhole, but it was on the verge of collapse. I had half-hoped of returning to my universe, but the Vraknirma scans dashed my hopes. The universe that was on the other end of the wormhole... it was virtually destroyed. To this day we're not certain why, but perhaps the destruction of the Excelsior was more devastating than any of us could have imagined. It may have started some kind of chain reaction, ripping my home universe apart. The wormhole collapsed shortly afterwards. My home was gone. My wife and children. Everything in that universe is no more. I returned to Earth in this universe to carry out the duty that I had assigned myself: to watch over this world in secret and see that it doesn't fall into harm. As much as possible anyway.

I've said that the people of Atlantis didn't really pay any attention to me. They saw me as being a strange individual, potentially dangerous but not outwardly hostile. That changed about 9,000 years ago, when two children, under the supervision of a priest, observed me engaging in activity they considered curious. I was working on erecting a stone circle. Why? I wanted to use it to try and pinpoint the precise point of history I was living in, and also to try and keep track of the passage of time. Before you ask, I _could_ have used a more advanced method, but I chose not to for reasons that aren't relevant to this narrative. The Atlanteans were already aware of my abilities, so seeing me levitate rock slabs weighing more than a ton each was not strange to them. They were compelled by fascination to ask me what I was doing. I had already heard them speaking before, and had already learned that I can instantaneously master languages, so I wasn't surprised when I knew what was being said as though it was spoken in English. I explained the purpose and the function of the stone circle, which strengthened the fascination of the priest. From then on, the priests would frequently use my stone circle as part of their administration over the domain. I have always kept out of their affairs since it is not my place to intervene. That would eventually change.

Joanna has already shared the incident surrounding the group of friends who disturbed a stone circle, so you know that they serve more than one purpose. It came to pass that I would seal away a similar creature myself within my stone circle, where it remains to this day. That is not the incident which changed my relationship with Atlantis. The incident that did, is connected with the incident that led to me pushing Joanna to publish the case file regarding the Joy Hunters. Atlantis was a booming civilisation, advancing well ahead of the rest of the world by millennia, under the watchful eye of myself and five members each from the Setvirians and the Vraknirma, who served as the first members of The Institute, along with four Atlantean priests. These priests had all had encounters with the supernatural, and so possessed special knowledge that made them worthy of The Institute. There is one thing I have not told you so far, but now is the time to change that. You see: Gods exist. Many of them. The Gods of every serious religion exist, as do many more that we Humans don't have a religion for, though other races do. They were beginning to look upon Atlantis and its rapid development unfavourably. They sent an emissary down to Atlantis, and I would later learn that it was deliberate that such an unsavoury emissary was chosen for the task.

The emissary was an angel called Ascates, who served Apollyon, who it transpired was a God and not an angel himself. A God of Destruction. I would see the truth of that in time. Ascates was to walk within Atlantis, examine it and its people, and report his findings back to Apollyon. To the Atlanteans, he was seen as an envoy from a far-off land. They never knew he was an angel. The people welcomed him graciously, treated him remarkably, but that didn't seem to matter. Ascates seemed intent on causing problems, and The Institute was watching over his movements very closely. I do not blame the priests for their actions. Ascates had been abusing his role as emissary and was taking advantage of the hospitality of the Atlanteans. Unlike the rest of humankind at the time, the Atlanteans had the concept of consensual sex, and regarded rape as a grave crime. They believed that no-one, not even an angel like Ascates, was above the laws of Atlantis. While the Guardians of the Sanctum of Atlantis were dispatched to arrest Ascates, one of the priests came to me, knowing that the Guardians would not be able to do what needed to be done. Ascates was offended to have humans attempt to detain him for crimes under human laws, and slew the Guardians violently, before attempting to pass his judgement upon the nation as a whole. The priest was right to call for me. Not even the Setvirians nor the Vraknirma would have been capable of tackling Ascates. Only I had the power to do so, but Ascates chose to fight to the death. Perhaps if I had held back, the consequences would have been less dire. I gain nothing by dwelling upon this, however. What's done is done, though I still hate myself that innocent people paid the price.

I knew that Apollyon would be angered by the death of his angel. I knew that he would seek vengeance. I did not however expect him to take matters into his own hands personally. To my knowledge, this is the only time that a God has ever descended to the realm of mankind, and Apollyon did so in a murderous rage. It was then that I learned how appropriate it was that he was the God of Destruction. In a furious rampage, Apollyon brought Armageddon down upon Atlantis. The Setvirians and the Vraknirma survived. I had urged them to evacuate beforehand, and they had heeded my warning. I survived too, but the people of Atlantis were consumed by fire and locusts. When Apollyon tried to extend his vendetta to cover all mankind, I had to muster my courage to intervene. I didn't know what I hoped to accomplish. Sure, I had powers that no-one else possessed, and that I could kill and angel, but a God? The God of Destruction no less. I didn't know if I could do that, but I had to try. I contained the plagues, first of all, before striking out against Apollyon. I still don't believe it was especially effective, but it certainly seemed to shock and surprise the God. He ascended to Heaven, and I gave chase. Heaven is not what it is depicted in the Bible. Mankind does not go there, no matter how pure their souls. Heaven is the abode of the Gods alone, and rather than a paradise; it is a collection of temples. Each God has its own temple, and as I would come to figure out: the temples are the source of the powers of the Gods. Apollyon had been shocked by my ability to harm him, but that shock turned to horror when he realised that I had followed him into Heaven. It was my turn to be consumed by rage. I found the source of Apollyon's power: a crystal the size of a small asteroid, and I shattered it into dust. I ripped the God of Destruction to pieces and brought down his temple upon his mangled corpse. My actions did not go unnoticed. The other Gods knew what I did, knew what I was capable of, but for a brief moment they didn't know how to respond. That moment of hesitation was my one and only chance to make sure that history never repeated itself, to make sure that no-one would ever suffer divine wrath as Atlantis had. I seized that moment with a bold plan. I extended my consciousness across the entirety of Heaven, to the crystals that gave the Gods their powers. I syphoned off a portion of power from each crystal, and used it with my own power to create a new life-form. This life-form was divine in nature and passive in personality. It lives within a dimensional fold that formed upon the life-form's creation. I cannot describe the appearance of the life-form, only its purpose: to protect the universe from the Gods. It is essentially a living shield. The Gods cannot leave Heaven. If they try, their crystals will be shattered and their temples reduced to rubble. The Gods will be mortal, and virtually powerless. If the Gods try to kill the life-form, it will resist them with their own powers, and if necessary: it will destroy the source of their powers. In that one moment, I went to great lengths to ensure that there was no loophole that could be exploited to destroy the life-form that I had created.

There are two consequences to this, one good and one bad. The good consequence is that the mortal races of the universe are safe from divine wrath. True, the Gods can push their influence upon us, but we can choose to resist that influence. They can send angels, and I can kill those if need be. The negative consequence is that my own powers were limited during the creation of the living shield. As strong as I may seem to you now, it is only a fraction of the power I had up until the fall of Atlantis. This is why I insisted upon Joanna sharing the incident of the Joy Hunters. It's why I insist she focuses on the case files that have outcomes steeped in uncertainty and possible threat. I'm not strong any more. I weakened myself drastically that day. You cannot and must not depend upon me to save you. I can no longer kill a God. Not a fully-fledged one, though a Demi-God is still mortal enough for me to vanquish. I have never been omnipotent or omnipresent, but now I am far less capable of convincing people otherwise as I used to be. Teleporting even short distances takes tremendous effort and leaves me dangerously exhausted, hence why I rarely respond to incidents quick enough for a good result. My meeting with Joanna was a rare exception to this. You must not expect to be as lucky as she was. I arrived at the latest possible time to save her, but almost no-one else is that lucky. Evelyn Whitechapel, for example, had been dead for several hours before I could reach her. Even arriving that soon after death is rare for me. So don't depend upon me, or upon The Institute. Despite what we're capable of, we're extremely limited all the same. If you want to survive in this world, stay in your lane, as it were. Stay away from the supernatural, the extraterrestrial and the interdimensional. Rein in your curiosity, before it gets you killed. Neither I nor satisfaction will be able to bring you back. If you should happen to disturb horrors of a Lovecraftian style, you wouldn't want to be brought back anyway.

I will try to end this account on a lighter note. I mentioned earlier that Atlantis is still the site of The Institute's headquarters. This is true. While Atlantis was severely ravaged, it wasn't entirely destroyed. I relocated the ruined nation to a safer location, before single-handedly spreading various legends and rumours about its existence and location. I knew that people would find out about Atlantis some day despite its isolation and its destruction. Other human settlements had known of its existence, after all. So I spun my own false narratives to throw off future explorers, and ensure they never found it. They are all looking in the wrong places because they don't know it has been moved. They don't know anyone exists who can move an entire nation, volcano included. I will not divulge the current whereabouts of Atlantis, but it is safe. You should be content with that. I have restored the buildings to their former splendour and I've maintained them very well. On the surface, Atlantis looks just as it always did. Underneath the surface is where the differences are. The Institute has expanded across the entirety of the nation, now an island nation, but without being visible from the surface. Using Institute technology, I have made Atlantis into a mobile island. We can, and frequently do, reposition Atlantis in order to keep it hidden. We also relocate on occasion to align with Ley Lines and dimensional rifts, if and when the need arises. 

The Setvirians and the Vraknirma have stayed with me in the 7,500 years since Atlantis was ravaged, sending new operatives as the older ones retire. Hundreds of other races have joined The Institute, but only a handful send operatives to Earth. Inari; who Joanna mentioned in the case file regarding a gamer being transformed into an in-game object: is one of those operatives, and an outstanding member of the Kithuan race, which shares many personality traits with humans. In the entire history of The Institute, I had never selected a human candidate, until I met Joanna. All other human operatives were selected by The Director, who is an individual, not always Human, elected to that position by a committee of 316 alien races. What was it about Joanna that made me choose her to join The Institute? Maybe someday I'll tell you. Maybe.

And so my friends, that concludes my origin story. From soldier, to hero, to security guard, to a borderline immortal with supernatural powers. Though I helped found The Institute, I have never once held the position of The Director, for much the same reason that I served on the frontlines of combat even as a Field Marshal. It's where I belong, and it's where people need me to be, even if I dislike them depending on me. You may ask: will I post here again? As it happens, there is a case file I plan to share in the near future. I kept Joanna away from that incident for her own protection. You will see why in time. Until then: stay safe, stay alive, and stay away from things not of this world or this dimension.


End file.
